Sunday, April 26, 2009
Easter 3B
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton
1 John 3:1-7
Reading this passage, there’s a term that comes to mind: mercurial. It is a direct reference to what we see happen with a thermometer … or, I should say, with the old-style thermometers – the kind that had mercury in them. This particular illustration wouldn’t work if I said ‘digital’ and tried to explain what I meant by using the example of a digital thermometer. Think back to what the mercury in an old thermometer used to do when the temperature changed – it would move up the tube inside the glass – up, up, up … or plummet down and down and down, depending on how hot or cold it was. There’s almost a physical break when we move from verse 3 to verse 4. In one breath, John is waxing eloquent about hope and purity, and in the next he seems to be digressing about sin and lawlessness. We will get to that.
But first, I’d like to explore a little about the imagery and terminology used in those beautiful first three verses.
John begins the thought in the passage with an expression that means in essence, ‘see what KIND of love the father has given us’ – in other words – ‘this is the way God has loved us – through Jesus he has shown us what it means to be children of God – because that is what we are!’. While that can be a precious and energizing thought, by the same token, it is a heads up for his followers – not just in late first century Turkey and Greece, but also in early twenty-first century Northern Neck Virginia.
He goes on to explain when he says ‘Beloved, we are God’s children now.’ The meaning of that sentence can change, depending on where the emphasis is placed. If we read it with the emphasis on the word “are” it means one thing: “Beloved, we ARE God’s children now” means one thing – the emphasis on the fact that through Jesus we have been adopted as children of God, and that the fact of our adoption is the principal point of the statement COULD be one way to read this sentence. Another way would be with the emphasis on the word “God” – in other words, “Beloved, we are GOD’S children now” would remind his readers and us as well of the fact of who we belong to – that we are God’s children – a precious and laudable point to be made.
I think John may have been writing to emphasize a different point … if we read the passage as a whole, both the sentence in question and the one following, we see there is a juxtaposition going on, something that is actually carried through the whole thought process in this passage. I think if we read it in the following way: “Beloved, we are God’s children NOW; --what we will be has not yet been revealed.”
In other words, he IS saying that we ARE GOD’S children, yes, but the thing is, we are God’s children NOW – in spite of not really knowing what we will be in the hereafter. Then he goes back, and says ‘even though we DON’T know what that will be like, we DO know THIS: when he DOES come, we will be like him, because we will see him as who he REALLY is.
Easter 3B
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton
1 John 3:1-7
1See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God; and that is what we are. The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. 2Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is. 3And all who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.
4Everyone who commits sin is guilty of lawlessness; sin is lawlessness.5You know that he was revealed to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. 6No one who abides in him sins; no one who sins has either seen him or known him. 7Little children, let no one deceive you. Everyone who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous.
Reading this passage, there’s a term that comes to mind: mercurial. It is a direct reference to what we see happen with a thermometer … or, I should say, with the old-style thermometers – the kind that had mercury in them. This particular illustration wouldn’t work if I said ‘digital’ and tried to explain what I meant by using the example of a digital thermometer. Think back to what the mercury in an old thermometer used to do when the temperature changed – it would move up the tube inside the glass – up, up, up … or plummet down and down and down, depending on how hot or cold it was. There’s almost a physical break when we move from verse 3 to verse 4. In one breath, John is waxing eloquent about hope and purity, and in the next he seems to be digressing about sin and lawlessness. We will get to that.
But first, I’d like to explore a little about the imagery and terminology used in those beautiful first three verses.
John begins the thought in the passage with an expression that means in essence, ‘see what KIND of love the father has given us’ – in other words – ‘this is the way God has loved us – through Jesus he has shown us what it means to be children of God – because that is what we are!’. While that can be a precious and energizing thought, by the same token, it is a heads up for his followers – not just in late first century Turkey and Greece, but also in early twenty-first century Northern Neck Virginia.
He goes on to explain when he says ‘Beloved, we are God’s children now.’ The meaning of that sentence can change, depending on where the emphasis is placed. If we read it with the emphasis on the word “are” it means one thing: “Beloved, we ARE God’s children now” means one thing – the emphasis on the fact that through Jesus we have been adopted as children of God, and that the fact of our adoption is the principal point of the statement COULD be one way to read this sentence. Another way would be with the emphasis on the word “God” – in other words, “Beloved, we are GOD’S children now” would remind his readers and us as well of the fact of who we belong to – that we are God’s children – a precious and laudable point to be made.
I think John may have been writing to emphasize a different point … if we read the passage as a whole, both the sentence in question and the one following, we see there is a juxtaposition going on, something that is actually carried through the whole thought process in this passage. I think if we read it in the following way: “Beloved, we are God’s children NOW; --what we will be has not yet been revealed.”
In other words, he IS saying that we ARE GOD’S children, yes, but the thing is, we are God’s children NOW – in spite of not really knowing what we will be in the hereafter. Then he goes back, and says ‘even though we DON’T know what that will be like, we DO know THIS: when he DOES come, we will be like him, because we will see him as who he REALLY is.
It almost seems like a stream of consciousness flow going on in the next few sentences.
This promise that we have – that we will be like him one day, brings us hope, because it is a hope based on the knowledge that, just as Jesus was free from sin, we will also one day be free from sin. In that sense, we will be like him.
4Everyone who commits sin is guilty of lawlessness; sin is lawlessness.5You know that he was revealed to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. 6No one who abides in him sins; no one who sins has either seen him or known him. 7Little children, let no one deceive you. Everyone who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous
Frankly, this seems to be, in tone at least, contradictory to what John says at the beginning of the letter – what we saw last week – where he wrote that ‘if someone says they don’t sin, they are fooling themselves’. There seems to be a dissonance between the two passages. This seems a far cry from John’s assertion that Jesus’ sacrifice was sufficient for the sins of the WORLD.
That overwhelming, all-encompassing grace seems to have dried up in the space of the intervening chapter.
But let’s look at it a different way. Perhaps what John is saying ISN’T that followers of Jesus are incapable of sinning, but that when we DO sin, and as he said in chapter 1, don’t think we DON’T, when he says ‘no one who abides in him sins, no one who sins has either seen him or known him’, he may well be saying that we, who profess him as Lord of our lives, are in that moment of sinning, shutting him out, we are DISclaiming what we supposedly hold dear to our hearts. By our actions we are in effect negating our statement otherwise that we ARE followers of Jesus Christ. In that moment when we are committing that act, or harboring that thought, or allowing that twist to take root, we are closing our eyes to the Jesus we know, we are disassociating ourselves from the Lord who gave his life for ours, we are no longer abiding in him – and for that moment, at least, we are dimming the light of Christ rather than reflecting it.
But John doesn’t leave it at that – remember there is a pattern of juxtaposition running throughout the passage. He has just painted a fairly bleak picture of supposed believers failing in their faith. He reiterates on the positive at the conclusion of the thought:
7Little children, let no one deceive you. Everyone who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous
His concluding words are uplifting: if you DO what is right, you are righteous, and not just on your own merit, but just as Jesus is righteous. Again John reminds the believers that being in Christ means BEING CHRIST, that Jesus overlays US when it comes to consideration on the part of God.
What does this mean for Jerusalem Baptist Church at Emmerton?
It means we can’t pretend to in any way approach the throne of grace on OUR terms; that our only salvation IS through the gift and sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. That in that sacrifice we find our identity, our motivation, our reason for being CALLED children of God.
Let’s pray.
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